Fixing the Pencil Tool drawing line in Flash CS4 in 64 bit versions of Windows 7
On the eve of the launch of Adobe's CS5 I wanted to post a fix I discovered for one of the really annoying problems I came across in Flash CS4.
The pencil tool (defaulted to the Y key in Windows), in all 64bit versions of Windows 7 does not show a drawing guide as you draw with a Wacom tablet (ie. when you're drawing a line, you don't see the rendered line until your Wacom pen has completely lifted off the tablet). In fact it doesn't even work when using a mouse to draw.
The solution is actually quite simple, albeit a bit of a work-around. All you have to do is disable Windows Aero features. Simply Right Click on your desktop and select Personalize. Select the Windows 7 Basic theme from the list of themes displayed in the themes dialogue.
Let's hope this little glitch is fixed in CS5, which I can't wait to get my hands on.
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My name is Kris Robinson, this is where I blog about art, computers, illustration, design, work, life and other stuff... basically anything that pops into my head.
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Comments
lars
1 years agoGreat that you have told me how to see the pencil-line while drawing :-)
Thanks alot :-)
Lars / Copenhagen
Kris Robinson
1 years ago@Kelly: No idea the cause, most likely an incompatibility issue with Adobe engine and the Aero display engine.
I came across the solution by chance at work.
Thanks for the adobe forum link. Cheers.
Kelly
1 years agoYou may also be interested in this thread:
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/494513
Kelly
1 years agoKris, I'm not using an Aero Theme, opting instead to use my own desktop background (a photo of my wife), window color Frost, Sonata for the sounds and no screen saver; yet the annoyance of not being able to see the drawn pencil line persists. I'm running CS4 on a Win7 64-but system and a Calcomp tablet with TabletWorks v10.08 Build 14 drivers.
Just as you've outlined above, choosing the Windows 7 Basic theme magically made the pencil tool work - immediately :) ... and just as quickly, having changed the theme back, the pencil tool fails to render a line until the stroke has completed.
So my question: Has anybody figured out why this happens? the cause? and the solution? (not that your work-around isn't short of brilliant - btw, how did you discover it?)
Kris Robinson
1 years agoNo worries, glad it worked out for ya.
Anonymous
2 yearss agoThanks so much for this. It was bothering the heck out of me!
Oscar
2 yearss agoYou saved my life (and animation project). Thanks man. <3<3
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